In brief

• Google has acquired an unfinished data center site in southeast Wyoming from Crusoe.
• Google plans to invest $17 billion to develop the campus, which Tallgrass Energy partnered on and which is planned to reach 10 GW.
• The purchase price has not been disclosed, and the deal highlights the difficulty of delivering large projects on budget.

Google takes over the Wyoming campus

Crusoe, the Denver-based data center developer, has handed an unfinished project in southeast Wyoming to Google, a deal the company confirmed on Friday (Crusoe sells troubled Wyoming data center project to Google – TechCrunch) (Google has acquired Crusoe's data center site in southeast Wyoming – Hacker News). Google had earlier tried to become a customer for the site, which Crusoe had not managed to complete. Google is now taking over its development.

According to reports, Google had raised doubts about the cost and construction schedule under Crusoe's management before stepping in. Crusoe said the pre-development phase, covering site selection, government approvals and a hybrid power strategy worked out with Tallgrass Energy, has been completed (Google acquires Wyoming data center site from AI infrastructure firm Crusoe – Investing.com).

Project background

Crusoe first announced the campus last year together with Tallgrass, the infrastructure company backed by Blackstone. The partners planned to scale the site eventually to 10 gigawatts of power capacity. The two companies worked on power and data center infrastructure in parallel, coordinating energy systems, engineering and site development.

Price and investment

The purchase price has not been made public. Google has announced plans to invest 17 billion dollars in developing the campus.

Industry context

The deal shows how hard it can be for independent developers to deliver very large data center projects on schedule and within budget. Securing equipment and power has proven difficult, and growing opposition from local communities can add further complications. Crusoe said it has more than 6 GW under contract and over 40 GW in its pipeline.